The Best Spiritual Book of the Year

This controversial study of Christianity's treatment of the Jews from imperial Rome to Auschwitz is a feat of research, literary skill and historical imagination. In exposing the two faiths' continuing deep entanglements, the book is a testament to what happens when any religion becomes invested with power. Carroll's attempt to expiate the Church's past avoids, Harvey Cox says in Beliefnet's review, self-righteous breast-beating. Instead, Carroll, an ex-Catholic priest, seems to have internalized the history of the Church since Constantine adopted Christianity as Rome's official religion, and presents it as a seamless and compelling story. It is our second Beliefnet Book of the Year. Our other finalists follow.

Sharon Spiegelman, the guileless narrator of this funny, sympathetic novel, begins her new life on a whale-watching cruise off Hawaii, where she sees God. Sharon's search to find that moment of bliss again leads her to Nature worship, Buddhism, born-again Christianity, self-help seminars and Judaism. Sharon's naive enthusiasm is occasionally exasperating, but serves Goodman in her unflinching examination of what we expect from religion, why it often fails us and we it.

This report from the director of Harvard University's Pluralism Project gets beyond the number-crunching and religious demographics to bring alive the ethnic diversity in the United States' houses of worship, and how it is affecting natives and immigrants alike.

This guide to becoming a "spiritual warrior" by a prominent Buddhist nun became a book for the times after 9/11. While many try to be fearless by being strong, Chodron believes that we're more likely to hold our own by remaining open and vulnerable to all our feelings.

We could recommend this history of early Pentacostalism on the basis of its wit and bright prose alone. It also happens to be a beautifully researched study of a group whose influence in the United States is at its peak.